This invention employs in part an assembly which has been employed in paper feeding but not for paper separation. That assembly is a pivoted gear train on a bracket having a driven gear at one end and a drive gear at the other end, with the direction of rotation of the drive gear being that to move the bracket toward a stack of papers to be feed. U.S. Pat. No. 3,306,491 to Eisner et al and U.S. Pat. No. 4,925,177 to Nakamura et al show such a paper feed, although without any apparent recognition that the force of the feed roller is dynamic in that rotation of the feed roller automatically relieves downward form from the driven gear. U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/406,233 of Padget et al, assigned to the assignee of this invention, is directed to a paper picker, not a separator, in which the dynamic forces of the gear train employed are those employed in this invention.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,377,970 to Kikachi is a sheet separator having much of the structure of this invention with the drive roller driven as in this invention. However, the drive roller is opposite a fixed surface, not a roller and the patent exhibits no apparent recognition that the force of the feed roller is dynamic. U.S. Pat. No. 5,312,098 to Inoue is a sheet separator having much of the structure of this invention but the drive roller is driven in the opposite direction, which reverses any dynamic pressure effects with respect to this invention and therefore is fundamentally different from this invention. U.S. Pat. No. 4,368,881 to Landa is a separating paper feeder having a nip of a drive roller and an opposing roller, as does this invention, with the reverse force of the opposing roller being self adjusting by use of a coil-spring clutch. This invention employs self adjusting nip force achieved by a gear train mounted in a bracket. U.S. Pat. No. 4,546,963 to Dinnissen employs pinch rollers for separation with one roller mounted on a bracket. However, since that pinch roller is not driven through a drive train, the dynamic forces of this invention could not occur.